Supporting Our Merchants

Our merchant corridors are filled with vibrant and unique shops, delicious restaurants, food markets and vital service providers. Recently we have heard a lot about proposed changes to our district – upzoning that would put eight-story buildings on Richmond District streets, like Clement and Balboa, and 14-story buildings along Geary Boulevard.

While we need to be creative about building more housing for our working families, without strong protections, this would most certainly lead to real estate speculators targeting our neighborhood, displacing long-time residents and our beloved legacy businesses like Joe’s Ice Cream, Green Apple Books and more. Certainly, if we have empty buildings, discussions for rezoning are appropriate, but the mayor’s one-size-fits-all plan for upzoning does not serve our community.

This is why I am opposed to this plan and why I joined Board President Aaron Peskin to create new protections for legacy businesses. This legislation will require a higher level of scrutiny before demolishing a building that houses a legacy or neighborhood anchoring business.

We can also do more to protect our small businesses. I currently have proposed legislation that creates protections for small businesses, alleviating unfair taxes and fees, and creating a longer runway for small businesses to come into compliance with new regulations.

Commercial Vacancy Exemptions

Small business owners should not be penalized when city construction projects create hurdles to filling vacancies. We were made aware of just such an issue when a Richmond District resident and small business owner was unfairly penalized with a vacancy tax for their storefront when sewer and transit construction had made his storefront inaccessible and caused an unavoidable vacancy over the time limit imposed by the newly enacted commercial vacancy law. This law exists to incentivize landlords to lease out their vacant storefronts, not penalize them when city infrastructure projects make that impossible. To fix this issue, I enacted legislation to waive the commercial vacancy fee assessed by the Department of Building Inspection, and I am introducing legislation this month to exclude certain storefronts from the commercial vacancy tax due to public infrastructure construction.

Awning Extension

This past June, the Board of Supervisors passed legislation to extend the awning amnesty program through to June 2025, allowing small businesses time to come into compliance with permit regulations. This legislation also includes my amendment to waive accrued fees and allow business owners to legalize their existing unpermitted awnings without having to pay any assessed fees and abate any notices of violation for the awnings. To ensure that Richmond District businesses were made aware of this amnesty, my team visited businesses that had been identified by the Office of Small Business as noncompliant.

ADA Compliance Extension

Similarly, our small businesses are being asked to come into compliance with the Americans with Disability Act. This can pose a challenge for businesses, particularly our older storefronts with slopes, stairs and other structural barriers at their entrances, and can become quite costly. Earlier this year we passed legislation extending the compliance deadline. While it is important to ensure access for everyone, we want to allow the time necessary for small businesses to thrive while coming into compliance. Our team has been visiting businesses with identified issues to help them develop a plan.

Small businesses are the heart and soul of the Richmond District and as your supervisor, I am here to help them continue to thrive. See you out in the neighborhood!

Connie Chan represents District 1 on the San Francisco Board of Supervisors. She can be reached at 415-554-7410 or chanstaff@sfgov.org.